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Air Asia Becomes First Low-Cost Carrier To Debut Lie-Flat Seats

We knew this day would come. As low-cost carriers embark on ever-longer flights and continue to compete with legacy carriers, they're starting to look into offering up a few perks atypical of LCCs, like say lie-flat first class seats. But Air Asia X has gone further than just thinking about it; they've just installed 12 such spots on A330s and 18 on the A340s, scheduled to fly their long-haul route between London and Kuala Lumpur beginning in June 2010. 28 premium economy seats had to be axed out to make room for these pretty babies, but it'll be well worth it once passengers realize that these lie-flat seats aren't astronomically priced like typical first class.

It's still LCC Air Asia X after all, so don't expect five-star dining and VIP treatment and champagne. They don't even seat-back TVs, preferring instead to explore portable entertainment device options which haven't yet been decided upon. And if you've got a lie-flat seat for that whole flight, who wants to watch TV anyway? Go on and sleep!

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Talking With Air Asia's CEO Tony Fernandes About US Plans

A Jaunted Exclusive

We've been following the secretive saga behind the Air Asia X plane gone native—meaning it slipped into some Oakland Raiders livery—ever since May when it's tail was spotted getting the new paintjob. We speculated that perhaps this meant one of two things: either the Oakland Raiders football team was chartering an AirAsia plane for their season, or Air Asia was readying for some trans-Pacific routes to the United States.

After the plane flew to Oakland for a grand unveiling last week, we had to get to the bottom of the deal. Is Air Asia coming to the United States or what? So we dialed up the Air Asia CEO and mogul Tony Fernandes for a quick rundown of the low-cost carrier's North American plans.

And here's what he said...

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Airline Rumors / Air Asia X / New Routes / Gossip / Kuala Lumpur Travel / → All Tags

Air Asia X Wants to Long-Haul You From New York and California

Update: Just heard from our tipster, the plan is to have the flights be direct to KL from Cali and JFK.

We love airline rumors! It's been a long time since we had something juicy to talk about. So let's get gossiping.

A tipster says that Air Asia X is looking to possibly expand its routes to Kuala Lumpur and they have their eyes set on the United States.

Azran Osman Rani (CEO of AirAsia X) has been talking to JFK and 2 California airports regarding launching long haul service from KL. There's nothing definitive lined up, but the time-frame would be in about a year.

Now, we're working on tracking down when this would be an alliance between Air Asia and another airline, or if Air Asia would man the flight(s) the whole way. But if you've got any more inside scoop, we'd love to hear it. Similarly, would you fly Air Asia X from the states to KL on their no-frills planes? Let us know.

Related Stories:
· Inside The No-Frills, Long-Haul Flight on Air Asia X [Jaunted]